My proposal for railcard reform under GBR

[Richardr]

The GB rail system is an overpriced shambles, however it would be difficult to unpick all of the inconsistencies and anomalies that have built up during the privatised era (and frankly I wouldn't trust them to do it to the benefit of passengers anyway).

The easiest way to heal the running sore of poor value train travel for working age people outside of the South East would be a national railcard.

The railcard infrastructure to administer it already exists. It comes with its own revenue stream on top of fares.

It might cost more in subsidy, but given the poor optics of being out of kilter with the rest of Europe and having working age residents in lower income areas of the country comparatively discriminated against, the Establishment probably ought to just suck it up and introduce one.

If, and it is a big if, fares outside the South East are poor value, then surely the answer is to reduce those fares rather than introduce a national railcard which would not alter the relative fares between the South East and elsewhere.

 

[81A]

In the real world, I suspect that at least some of those advocating changes to railcards which would disadvantage some holders are actually disenfranchised - do not have the right to hold one - and are thus taking their position primarily out of spite.

Certainly not in my case-as someone who makes use of the various young persons/student railcards/discounts (and will be eligible for some time to come), as well as being competent in split ticketing (including manually), break of journey, long buying, rangers/rovers et cetera, any fares/railcard simplification/reform is likely to hit me as a hefty fares increase. The reason I would still advocate it is that I want the railway to grow and think the current labyrinthine ticketing system does not help.

If the current system can be demonstrated to be the best for the railway (passenger growth/revenue growth balance) and not too much of a burden on the taxpayer, I would be thrilled (I could continue to use my ticketing knowledge combined with eligibility for discounts to travel very cheaply for years to come).

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 30 Jun 2026 ==

I'm afraid with the triple lock, home ownership distribution, and the state of the housing market I can't find too much sympathy for non-disabled seniors.

Agreed, elderly people may have once been a disadvantaged group, but the current generation is better off than younger people on average. When the government is short on money for essential things (defence, keeping the NHS basically functional et cetera) and taxes have already been hiked massively, benefits should absolutely be restricted to those who strictly need them.

Nevertheless, my second proposal still gives the elderly perks to some extent (definitely they are not treated worse than 19-30 year olds), so claiming some form of discrimination against the elderly seems a bit odd?

 

[andy50027]

I’ve often thought there should be a night shift worker railcard.
I work on the gates at Guildford and it’s sad to see all those coming from the Royal Surrey Hospital after their night shift having to pay peak rate single fares home when they’ve already had to buy a single off peak to get to work the night before.

 

[mr_jrt]

I’ve often thought there should be a night shift worker railcard.
I work on the gates at Guildford and it’s sad to see all those coming from the Royal Surrey Hospital after their night shift having to pay peak rate single fares home when they’ve already had to buy a single off peak to get to work the night before.

Surely that's no different to a day shift worker having to buy a peak single to get to work and an off-peak single to get home? Arguably paying key workers better would be the ideal solution there?

As for the earlier point about simplification being worse...I don't see it as a necessary outcome. I still think there are too many variations on T&Cs that can be distilled down to basically one restriction - peak validity or not. All the other eligibility aspects become things you can deal with at the point of purchase. Young, old, disabled, jobseekers - cheap subsidised peak validity card with differing price points for different groups. Everyone else has the option to buy an expensive card with peak validity, or a much cheaper off-peak only version.

I don't really see how loosening restrictions would be considered a worse deal. The only exception to that I can see is the 16-17 saver giving a 50% discount rather than the 33% all other cards provide. It would be interesting to learn what the average savings per year are for holders of that card, and whether you could balance that out by lowering the price to offset any reduced discount. Or just give everyone the 50% discount, perhaps only on the peak version of the card as an added incentive for people to consider the expensive version?

I'm probably missing a lot of detail - I've only ever held the 16-25 card, and then a vanilla NR, but all the other variations seem to relate to varying validity times and minimum fares. Remove those restrictions and they all are essentially the same offering as far as I can see?

 

[The Ham]

Surely that's no different to a day shift worker having to buy a peak single to get to work and an off-peak single to get home? Arguably paying key workers better would be the ideal solution there?

A night shift worker has to buy a single for day 1 (start of 1st shift), a return for day 2 (end of 1st beginning of 2nd), a return for day 3 (end of 2nd beginningof 3rd) and a peak single for day 4 (end of 3rd shift) for 3 shifts a day worker would only need to buy 3 returns. It gets worse if a shift worker works 2 days a day gap two days as they can only buy 2 returns but 4 singles, whilst a day worker just gets 4 returns.

For somewhere where the cost of a return ticket isn't that much more than the single (Guildford to Ash anytime single is £6 whilst an anytime return is £6.30, with off peaks tickets being £6 for the single and £6.20 for the return) means that the costs can mount up quickly.

Using the Guildford to Ash example a night shift worker doing a run of 3 shifts would pay £24.60 (maybe £22.60 with 1/3rd off the first evening ticket) whilst their day worker would pay £18.90. That's 30% more for the same usage.

If there was a night ticket (out after 14:00 return before 12:00 the next day) which cost 1% or 10p more (whichever was the greater) then the night shift worker in the above would pay 30p more.

The overall impact onthe railways revenue would be tiny, however could easily be cost neutral as more people would do local overnight trips - be that shift workers, people out for the night, or just someone goingto see a friend for the evening.

 

[yorksrob]

If, and it is a big if, fares outside the South East are poor value, then surely the answer is to reduce those fares rather than introduce a national railcard which would not alter the relative fares between the South East and elsewhere.

I don't think it's as easy to say that fares in the South East are particularly worse value than elsewhere. Some of the more expensive ones there are similar to walk on fares on trans pennine and local journeys on the east coast.

I think in the South East the Network card provides a far simpler, more customer friendly way of obtaining discounts (or as I would call it reasonably priced travel that enable passengers to travel in a way that's convenient to them), whereas in the North, we're stuck with having to juggle advance fares where they exist over a hotch-potch of often incompatible fares structures and different companies.

It would be better for passengers to adopt the Network Railcard approach nationwide. The industry movers and shakers (with their already heavily discounted rail travel) or the Government and Whitehall in London (with its comprehensive and cheap public transport) might not like it, but the railway should be run for the convenience of its passengers, not itself.